BHOPAL: The April 9 assembly by-election to the Ater seat of Bhind district has turned out to be a pulsating battle between the ruling BJP and the Congress, with the opposition party ultimately managing to scrape through by 857 votes after the 21st and final round of counting.
While not detailing about the actual votes polled by the victorious Congress candidate Hemant Katare, and the ruling BJP's Arvind Singh Bhadoriya, election commission sources in Bhopal confirmed to the New Indian Express about Katare's win by 857 votes.
The young Congress candidate, Hemant Katare, was leading by a comfortable over 8000 votes margin against ruling party candidate Arvind Singh Bhadoriya till the 17th round of counting, but the lead was narrowed dramatically by the BJP between the 19th and 21st round.
In an important development, chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan tweeted that the party accepts the verdict of the people. He dubbed the people's verdict as the victory of public vote in a democracy.
In another tweet the CM thanked those who voted for the BJP in Ater.
Meanwhile, State BJP president Nandkumar Singh Chauhan and senior Madhya Pradesh minister Umashankar Gupta said the party's loss in Ater is particularly due to the sympathy wave among voters for Congress candidate Hemant Katare.
"We'll review the result in Ater," they said
The demise of Katare's father and 2013 winner from the seat, Satyadev Katare, (leader of opposition in state assembly) in October 2016 had necessitated the bypoll.
The Ater (Bhind) bypoll had hogged headlines nationally following the VVPAT-dummy test controversy, and the violence that marred the April 9 bypoll.
In the bypoll to the Bandhavgarh (ST) seat, BJP candidate Shivnarayan Singh won by a record margin of 25,000 plus votes. Never in the past has the seat reserved for scheduled tribe in Umaria district been won by more than 20,000 votes.